


A Powerful Stellar Eruption

by seterasilence



Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Aziraphale Loves Crowley (Good Omens), Aziraphale's True Form (Good Omens), Crowley Loves Aziraphale (Good Omens), Crowley's True Form (Good Omens), Egg-laying, Established Relationship, Gratuitous Use of Farmers Markets, Ineffable Husbands (Good Omens), Insecurity, Intimacy, Jealous Snake Crowley, M/M, Meryl the Snake, More like Star-Laying But Whatever, Snake Crowley (Good Omens), Snake behavior
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-22
Updated: 2020-11-22
Packaged: 2021-03-10 01:42:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,895
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27665582
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seterasilence/pseuds/seterasilence
Summary: Instincts are a curious thing and when you're a demon snake stuffed inside a human corporation, odd occurrences are bound to happen.The hot smell of burning hydrogen tipped Crowley off that something dreadful loomed on the horizon, but he didn’t expect it to happen so soon after three months settled in a cottage by the ocean, in Jack’s Reptile House of Scales, with a white python named Meryl.Originally appeared in the Get a Wiggle On Zine.Thanks to @insertnerdyjokehere for swift beta-ing skills and providing the name Meryl at one point,  while we were many ciders in, talking fandom in the middle of a near-empty ciderhouse.
Relationships: Aziraphale & Crowley (Good Omens), Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 8
Kudos: 106
Collections: Crowley's Demonic Side, Get A Wiggle On Zine





	A Powerful Stellar Eruption

The hot smell of burning hydrogen tipped Crowley off that something dreadful loomed on the horizon, but he didn’t expect it to happen so soon after three months settled in a cottage by the ocean, in Jack’s Reptile House of Scales, with a white python named Meryl. 

Meryl. She of the iridescent scales shimmering with rainbows who nudged her flat head into Aziraphale’s open palm like a newborn milk-drunk kitten. Crowley had been near the other end of the store when he caught sight of her—grousing about the unacceptable terror levels that plastic foliage could achieve, mid-complaint about how he, the original tempter, was now being forced to go to the Gem Faire of Rare Earth Minerals simply because that’s what is _done_ in retirement—when he caught sight of Meryl, radiating contentedness, flickering her tongue against his angel.

And Aziraphale cooed at her about how beautiful she was, how gorgeous and sweet—

The celestial serpent inside Crowley was momentarily aghast. She’d been eagerly coiled and patient ever since Crowley had glimpsed the wide expanse of South Downs night sky littered with diamond starlight that had, previously, been hidden by smog since London’s Industrial Revolution. The huge mass of her had tightened into a quivering mess, frantically looking from the twinkling firmament to the angel warm with love next to him, and entered a state she hadn’t experienced in a long time. A very long time. Not since Crowley was a being of love.

At that point, the smell of burning hydrogen lingered in the back of his throat all hours of the day, a scent that strengthened as time passed and the sky didn’t darken and the angel didn’t leave. 

_We won’t let him leave,_ the celestial serpent hissed to him deep in the night, when he lay awake, an angel naked and cuddled in his arms. The rolling mass inside of him hated when he thought such impossible things and sought to soothe. _We bring him tea. We line our nest with books. Our human body is responsive to his pleasure. Why would he ever consider leaving? We should tell him. Please let us tell him._

Now, the serpent-soul of him thrashed in rage. Crowley shot across the store and lunged for Aziraphale, slithering up and under Aziraphale’s arm. The angel’s hand bumped and knocked off Meryl’s head. Pheromones leaked off of him. He smeared them from Aziraphale’s shoulder to neck to cheek, painting the angel in a wavering line of heavy gold helldust.

“Crowley, really.” Aziraphale sounded irritated, yet tightened his arm around Crowley’s shoulders with a sunny, blessed smile that didn’t match his tone. Confusing, that. Just like how _you go too fast for me_ sent him reeling for decades.

Meryl shrank back, confused. Poor thing. While Crowley presented as a male with all the associated human tendencies, the writhing serpent inside him was, at the moment, very female, very reptilian, and very wounded with eons of pent up yearning, pride, and possession. After 6,000 years, who could blame her?

_Good mate?_ Meryl asked Crowley with uncertainty. Aziraphale, not privy to the snake-speech, leaned down to stroke her scales and regain her trust. _Yes, good mate. We can share? Not many good mates here._

Crowley’s fangs slid out. His shoulder length hair waved on its own, kissing against Aziraphale’s skin. Yes, Aziraphale was a good mate. Yes, Crowley had just snotted pheromones all over him. Yes, maybe he was growing extra ribs at the moment and losing sensation in his legs and okay fine, yes, maybe he was growing a newborn star in the liminal space of his snake belly. He responded to Meryl with a mix of celestial hissing, human grunting, and a secondary release of hormones that splashed onto Aziraphale’s waistcoat. 

Thank Satan, the angel couldn’t see the stuff. Eden-crafted snakes generally didn’t have to deal with jealousy or pining or feelings of self-worth, but Crowley’s snake had been the final monstrous transformation of his star-maker soul, and the poor petal came with a slew of issues.

Fine. _He_ came with a slew of issues. 

“Crowley, please, I can’t move,” Aziraphale said, and Crowley realized he’d been trying to encircle Aziraphale with an unsuitable, unbendable human spine. 

“Snakes are the embodiment of evil,” Crowley pointed out. “She looks nasty, that one.” Regret hit him immediately. He wished he hadn’t spit such venom on Meryl’s feelings. Meryl, feeling the insult, held her head up high, turning away to ignore him.

“Not once you get to know them, darling.” Aziraphale flashed him a soft, adoring look—that look full of feelings and I love yous and bed-sharing in a house by the sea. 

Ugh. Crowley disentangled himself with effort. Inside, his snake-soul screeched to drag the angel home, make him forget about Meryl’s rainbow scales with her own black and red color combo. Sure, Meryl could lay speckled eggs, but Crowley’s clutch would be blindingly bright and twinkly.

No one said being a fallen, damned thing was easy. Especially when it was your God-given purpose to create celestial spheres. Birds got to fly, lions got to eat, and star-makers got to dip their hydrogen gases into the boiling brimstone heat of their internal hell to create shining helium. 

Usually, it wasn’t a problem. For the past millennium, he’d simply get drunk and fart a lot. But now, there was a malleable canvas of sky and an angel who kept looking at him with mushy softness, an angel who’d upgraded him from dear to darling, and well…he could only be so strong. Nature always found a way.

“C’mon angel, the rocks await,” he choked out and walked like a puppet with cut strings out of the store, leaving poor Meryl to hide in her fake foliage with a sad little sigh.

***

The Gem Faire of Rare Earth Metals filled up main street with vendors showcasing glittery elements dug up from the planet. Crowley’s tongue flickered out to gather the scents of copper, lithium, and beryllium even as Aziraphale clutched his arm tight with glee. 

“Look, my dear, doesn’t that look beautiful,” the angel gushed, touching the glimmering layers of blue chalk stuck on an unassuming brown stone. “The color is outstanding.”

“Lapis lazuli,” Crowley said, off-hand. Made from sulphur. Tasted like it, too. “Think there’s a homemade lemonade stand just up the way. Care to saunter?”

“I am parched,” Aziraphale said, and then rested his head on Crowley’s shoulder. “It makes me impossibly happy, being here with you,” he added, quietly.

Satan help him and all demonkind from ethereal love. Crowley’s writhing snake clenched in pleasure, making the hydrogen blooming inside his metaphysical body ache. “S’not too bad,” he managed, but his fingers wanted to be whole and together and one with the angel’s, so he pushed them against Aziraphale’s. 

“Look at that one,” Aziraphale said, breaking away to examine another stall lined with polished gems.

Quite the vendor, this one. Lots of sparkly pieces, ready for a ring setting or necklace. Crowley slunk around Aziraphale, drawn to a huge cut geode near the back. Purple quartz encircled the dark still opening inside, the outside a thick shell of tough unassuming black roughness. He tasted manganese, amethyst, and black calcite. His celestial snake hurt with how much she wanted it, because the stars were, literally, lining up: the cottage-home to nest, the mate to claim, the geode perfect for nestling newborn galaxies within. 

“I like this rock, angel,” Crowley said out loud before he could mentally slap himself quiet. “This right here is a nice rock.”

Aziraphale crouched down beside him. “Quite lovely, my dear. I didn’t know you had an interest in geology.” A pregnant pause. “Crowley, darling, are you alright? You’re looking a bit…scaley.”

A low protesting whine eeked out of Crowley’s throat. He glanced down. Scales popped up along the back of his hands—glowing with a galactic swirl of purples and blues and blacks. _Shit._ When he stood, he felt his spine creak and bend, longer than before. Extra ribs dug into his hip bones. Satan, he couldn’t be…it couldn’t be time, already, could it? He wasn’t prepared. He wasn’t ready. He was in the middle of a township farmer’s market show, for Satan’s sake. He couldn’t be getting ready to—

“I gotta go,” he said, pushing past the angel. “Enjoy the show, I’ll see you at home _IloveyouIhavetogo.”_

“Darling, don’t leave, I didn’t mean to embarrass you. Crowley please, I’ll purchase the geode for you, dearest, _where are you going?”_

But Crowley sprinted out of the market square, his heart thundering in his ears. A heart that now slipped down toward his navel as the celestial serpent inside him continued to unwind. He’d planned on explaining his snake tendencies to Aziraphale about a thousand years into their new relationship, but apparently you couldn’t put a serpent-soul in a situation of harmony without her deciding such bliss meant it was time to birth a new galaxy. 

_We told you,_ the serpent hissed. _You ignored the signs._

As soon as he cleared the town and hit the sandy beach, his knees bent and collapsed. His spine extended, his arms sucked into his body, until he merged with his celestial-snake counterpart and spooled as a long scaled mess following the shoreline in the direction of their cottage. He shot out a miracle to bar any humans from seeing him—a massive red-bellied serpent—slither for home. _Seclusion. Safety._

The tangy brine of seawater coated his tongue. Golden-white sand scraped the dry galactic swirls of his scales and he was reminded of eons past, before humans populated the globe, when he’d swum the ocean as a sea serpent, riding the currents and scaring fishermen and whalers. _Kraken,_ they’d shouted. _Hydra,_ they’d quivered in fear. _Leviathan._ It wouldn’t do for someone to cry wolf, or in this case Loch Ness Monster, and ruin everything he’d built with Aziraphale, and so soon.

Finally, the faint linger of angelic essence mingled with deeper brimstone tang crept down the shoreline. He paused, looked up to see the path winding through the bluffs and the familiar slope of their roof. His sides heaved with exertion. He curled into a coil around the bulge of his stomach. Hot agony rippled through him. He shuddered, trying to hold still until the pain passed. Another convulsion ripped through him, but at least the star was slowly moving with each contraction. He focused on the crashing waves cascading over the length of his tail, the cool breeze drifting over his body, but the pain wouldn’t end, it wouldn’t end, it wouldn’t end—

A light touch brushed against his scales. A worried, gentle voice whispered, “There you are.”

Blearily, Crowley looked up to see that the afternoon had slipped into a dark dusk. Aziraphale knelt before him—so small in his corporeal form, with wind-whipped curls and love coloring his bluebell eyes, and the glimmering reminder of helldust pheromones coating him. Crowley tried to speak, but shuddered as another stab of pain went through him. When he’d been a star-maker in Heaven, the burn had always been pleasant. But even that satisfaction had been taken from him in the fall. 

“Please let me know if I’m not welcome,” Aziraphale said softly, stroking down the grain of Crowley’s scales. “I sensed you needed alone time, but my darling, I felt you might have need of me.”

“Angel, you know I’m a…snake,” Crowley sounded out, feeling ridiculous and idiotic.

“The first serpent, yes I do recall.”

“But _before,_ I used to make stars.” Crowley gasped and quivered. “Still making stars, as it turns out. Just isn’t as fun anymore. Gonna pop one out as a matter of fact. Don’t get to use my hands like I used to.”

“Oh.” Aziraphale sat and crossed his legs in the sand. “I never knew. Does this…star-laying happen often?”

_Does it happen often?_ Crowley snorted a laugh, wondering how Aziraphale could look so interested when Crowley’d been keeping this from him since the very beginning. He hadn’t told Aziraphale about all this snake-mess because he wanted to avoid the inevitable scrunched nose of disgust. He’d die of shame if he had to say: _Angel, before we ride off into the sunset together, there’s a couple things you should know. My sheds will clog the bathtub, if it’s too cold I’ll hibernate, if it’s too hot I’ll faint, I swallow eggs whole and enjoy them, and last but not least, sometimes I’ll lay a clutch of stars._

“Not...too often,” he said instead. “Things are just…things are so good. You and me, and then there’s that nice black splotch in the firmament above our cottage that’s begging for a new constellation. Threw me off guard, is all. Kickstarted old habits. Figured I’d become celestially infertile sliding into the twentieth century, but I think it was just the air pollution.”

“You sound like you’re in pain.”

“A bit. More concerned about the massive burst of light that’s gonna come careening out of me. S’why I cleared the beach.”

Aziraphale hummed in agreement, even though his pinched face looked shocked and overwhelmed. His hand petting Crowley seemed much larger, a fact that grounded Crowley, despite the discomfort. “Would it be terrible of me to ask if I could stay with you? I don’t think it’s right, leaving you thus.” Aziraphale frowned, as if he wouldn’t take no for an answer, but he’d try.

“Sure, sure,” Crowley punched out, glad that at least Aziraphale hadn’t tucked tail and fled. At least Aziraphale hadn’t backed away, palms out, saying, _Well, it’s been fun, but it’s a bit too reptilian for my tastes, let’s call it a good effort and go back to once-a-year meet-ups._ “It’s almost there. Just don’t touch it. Comes out molten hot.”

Crowley tensed and heaved. A burning sting slashed through him and then a glowing mass of elements slipped out of his contracting body. The clutch swirled around each other and finally collided into one whole being. The sand around it melted into fulgurite. Crowley let out a relieved sigh and collapsed in an exhausted puddle. The air around him shifted, filled with the static electricity of an angel unzipping his human corporation, and he blinked up to see a many-eyed Principality peering at his newborn star. Aziraphale’s lion paw batted gently at the boiling orb, making the sand around it freeze up into a cocoon of glass.

Crowley’s celestial snake hormones sent waves of warm pride and pleasure rippling throughout him. Meryl had been right. The angel was a good mate, using principles like heat and fusion to create a protective sculpture of glass crust around Crowley’s newborn clutch. Aziraphale turned and leaned into Crowley’s coils, nuzzling Crowley’s neck. Crowley tried to stifle the sigh of contentedness hissing out of him. An eagle talon massaged gently underneath his scales, making him melt further. A thousand eyes focused on the loose loops of his body and Crowley trembled at the sudden, focused attention. 

“I am staggered by your beauty,” Aziraphale said, his voice a low growl. “I can’t count the number of times you’ve taken my breath away.”

“It’s just a star,” Crowley whispered, but his throat felt thick with affection, his heart clogged with overwhelming intimacy.

“Your happiness created light,” Aziraphale said, his large body settling down against Crowley, the stardust shine of his multi-eyed ethereal shape soft with love. A streak of glowing angelic essence reached out and wrapped around Crowley.

“I see myself having more of a dark and spooky inclination, personally. More of a black hole demon, me.”

“Perhaps you should strive to create something that doesn’t exude so much love then, darling.” Aziraphale’s three faces mocked him tenderly. 

“Shuddup.” Crowley ducked his head and tossed his coils around the angel, squeezing just enough. The dark essence of him wrapped around the angelic light, and the contact sent a thrill down his spine. Aziraphale was never more alluring than when he was stripped down and not stuffed into flesh. The ancient charred angel Crowley used to be yearned for him, wanted their dark and light to interplay forever.

“Where would you like to place it?” Aziraphale asked as he gathered the rest of Crowley up, slinging him around his shoulders. Crowley’s tail curled around the rings encircling Aziraphale, rubbed against the lion’s mane, delighting in their true forms finally being able to touch. Aziraphale cupped the star between his many long-fingered hands and smiled down at it.

The spread of night expanded before them. Crowley pointed his tail out and up. A patch of evening twilight, just in view of their new home, sat waiting. “Right there.”

Aziraphale reached up and pinched the night sky between clawed forefinger and thumb, and pulled it down like an elastic sheet, placing the star carefully in the firmament. It twinkled and gleamed, a small shine amongst its brothers and sisters. Crowley tightened around Aziraphale, unable to speak. 

“What beauty you’ve made,” Aziraphale said, all of his eyes adoring. “Shall we watch it for a while? Make sure it gets settled in up there?”

“I’d like that, angel.” 

Aziraphale eased back down on the sand, his wings sheltering Crowley again, and together they stared up at the new heavenly body born from a lifetime of forbidden friendship and impossible love.


End file.
